Banamichi

As Promised... Photos

Here is a photo of me singing our National anthem in front of the whole high school (all of 400 kids). the teacher in charge forgot to bring a recording, and i (jokingly) volunteered to sing it. well i was so nervous i forgot the words at one point! and as you can see my ojos are cerrado.

A La Clase De Ingles. the Mexican students interviewed the americans in English class. They had the most trouble spelling our answers on the worksheets, and i was having trouble pronouncing the mexican alphabet to help! oh and then we sang "no hay tortillas..." (think "o solo mio")

The courtyard of the hotel Banamichi, a beautiful place someone has spent lots of money restoring. it's the dearest place in town to stay, cheapest rooms are $60 a night. Each room is decorated with local art, old tin corona signs, and natural rocks and bricks. the honeymoon suite ($80 a night) had a bathtub you could swim in, with jets.

Agua Calientes, a natural hot spring where we had a barbeque. we rode up there in an ancient school bus on an ancient dirt road that wound and wound around the mountain! This little guy (a wasp?) smiled for the camera just as a snapped the photo.

a view of the channels filtering the water from the spring into the pools. each one was cooler than the last, and we hiked up to where the water came up- it was hot enough to cook an egg (but no sulphor smell)

La Lunata, party under the moon. the kid in the far right (purple hair) did not believe i was a teacher and kept asking me to dance i did not know enough spanish to explain to him the trouble we have in this country with teachers dating their students! all i could muster was "soy su maestra!"

at the science museum in Hermosillo, the capital of Sonora. Yes i am on a bed of nails! there was a plastic cover with holes and the nails came up with a motor and lifed me up. it felt... weird.

The last night at the school- there was a dance party. there are no extracurricular activites sponsored by the school, so the teacher there takes it upon herself to have music programs (she teaches guitar), a chior, and a stilts club. These boys were AWESOME! PS- the mariachi was my suitor from la lunata.

BIENVIENDOS A BANAMICHI

i am writing this message from mexico, on a mexican keyboard, which means i can´t find anything by touch. (the letters are all in the same places, but all the extra keys are mixed up!)
the at key, for instance, is on the Q button. although i can´t get to it by pressing shift, so i don´t really know how it is used. one thing about this trip, is they placed me with a host family in which neither speaks much english. in fact, the two years of spanish i took ten years ago has me more equipped to speak español to her than for her to speak inlgles to me. that´s another cool bit about this keyboard= ñ! it´s right there where the semicolon is on my keyboard at home.
besides being inspired to study my spanish (as i´m suddenly not so bad or shy about speaking like a three year old), this trip has been awesome. will definetly post some pics soon...
traveling to another country with 13 students in three vans is pretty cool. our hosts have kept us busy the whole time we have been here! today we took a 2 1/2 hour trip to hermosillo, the capital of sonora. the furthest south i have been in mexico! we saw museums and had lunch. yesterday, we went to aguas calientes and bathed in the hot springs. all the americans at least, the mexican kids did not go in until much later, when some were thrown in and many went in their clothes. ah, culture! am so glad i decided to be modest and wear a grandma suit- it turns out bikinis are really insulting around here.
mexican school is different as well, the classrooms are bare, nothing on the walls, nothing but desks, a teacher, and a blackboard. there are not students in special ed here, services do not go past elementary. also, everyone wears uniforms.
having a great an exhausting time. soon i will be home studying spanish again...
besos!

COOL SHOW!

No kidding. one channel and i'm watching it all the time. stupid t.v. like i have time to waste my time on the tube!
ok, i could turn it off. but that would defeat the purpose of the bunny ears. anyway, i do turn it off, on weekends. i am above watching football and nascar. I did, however, watch the NY marathon. YAY Lance Armstrong, in his tenth year of being cancer free- met his goal of running the marathon under three hours, with a few minutes to spare.

but i digress- the real reason for this post-

very. cool. show.
If you like the various movies made in the image of classic comic books, you will appreciate this show. it's about a group of heroes finding out about their superpowers (of course) by accident and coming together from all over the world (for what else?) to save the world.
"Save the cheerleader...Save the world!"

IN OTHER NEWS

tomorrow afternoon after 1:00 PM arizona time, please think nice thoughts for me as i battle the four hour bubble test + essay. due to my efforts at procrastination, i only have one chance to pass this test and yes it means my credential if i don't. I'm not so worried, i am a highly qualified sped teacher and the test is on special educaction stuff. and of course i am studying. to the point of headaches! and an eye twitch. but it will all be over in a matter of hours and then... the waiting game.

Rubanesque

there is a certian commercial i have been seeing on television for lotion. The tag line of this commercial is "feel like a woman" or something like that. the visual appears to be classical paintings come alive to use the product, such as the recreation of venus on the half shell here:


the trouble i have with this commercial is the largest model on the screen might fit loosely into a size six. how could they attempt to recreate classical paintings without using proper rubanesque women characterized by pear shapes and small, ponty boobs that splashed the "centerfolds" of the time?


Now, if you wan to read something truly smart, read this BLOG I would also like to add how well timed this particular article is- i had paintings on the brain and here it was. the perfect article to complement my thought process. must be a great mind ;). But since this forward thinking person also uses blgger beta, i was alas unable to comment on her awesome blog- therefore i make my comments here.
Incidentally, while researching, i stumbled on to this witty little piece... a different take on the DOVE ads that are recently receiving so much attention. Just food for thought!